


Gone, But Always Loved

by Hamimifk (BatchSan)



Category: Final Fantasy XII
Genre: Angst, Community: springkink, F/M, Frottage, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-02
Updated: 2012-01-02
Packaged: 2017-10-28 17:26:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/310284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BatchSan/pseuds/Hamimifk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Penelo watched them all go away forever, but the hardest one to let go of was the one she loved the most.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gone, But Always Loved

Quiet, Penelo knelt before the simple headstone, ignoring the mud that bunched around her knees and ignoring the scent of decay that clung to her nose the longer she stayed there. Years ago though, they had begun burning the bodies of deceased military persons to prevent, and spare, them the indignity of possibly becoming a zombie, as still occasionally seen. So the scent of decay came not from the ground but from the air all around the cemetary; rotten leaves and moldy, old headstones. Penelo continued praying for a moment more with her head down; lips in silent prayer. Finally, she looked up and rested her hands on the cold stone before her.

"Reks..." she said softly, tracing his name with her fingertips.

Long before this, when Penelo was still innocent to the horrors of the world, she had had a crush on her best friend's older brother. It was easy to be around him, having been use to the company of her own older brothers, but she couldn't hide her innocent blushes from Reks. He was the more levelheaded one. While Vaan blindly charged through life, Reks was quick to see the light in Penelo's eyes when she spoke to him and he politely listened to her every word.

When Penelo was nine, Reks kissed her for the first time. On the cheek, but it made her turn a bright red and stutter as he walked away laughing softly to himself. Vaan found Penelo dancing around the room in a flow of white fabric much too long for her, though that did nothing to hinder her childish, but oddly graceful, moves. He didn't understand girls and told Penelo she looked like a ghost to which she laughed and chased him out of the room and outside.

At ten, Penelo's two eldest brothers joined the Dalmasican knights even though there was an iffy tension between Rozarria and Archadia. She begged them not to go, afraid that they might be killed. They promised to write her every week and send her a toy from Nalbadia. Five months later, their dog tags were delivered to the family in two small boxes; killed when Rozarrians shot down a Archadian airship that crashed on their location.

Reks comforted Penelo when she ran to him and told him what had had happened. He kissed away her tears and told her in his new 'older' voice (his voice had grown deeper in the last year, and he was growing taller so Penelo had to crane her neck to look at him) that he would protect her. It was the only thing that could comfort the hole in her heart.

Penelo kissed Vaan on the cheek for the first time ever later that year. He blushed and stared at her like she was crazy. Penelo could only smile and tell him that he was like a brother to her. That the gods had taken two of her blood brothers but gave her two in their place in the form of Vaan and Reks. He just continued to blush, laughing nervously.

At twelve, Vaan and Reks' parents died from the plague. They came to live with Penelo's family, which was a mixed blessing for the girl. Happy to have Reks so close all the time, but she couldn't stand to see the pain in his eyes. That was the year she also began to learn White Magick, convinced that she could heal a broken heart one day.

At thirteen, Penelo's parents were killed at the market by warring soldiers from Archadia and Rozarria. If there was anything she regretted about that day, it was being asleep when they had left and never having the chance to say goodbye. Though if she had been up, she may have begged them to stay because attacks had been drawing closer to Rabanastre over the past several days.

When she was fourteen, Penelo went on a trip with Reks, Vaan, and her third eldest brother (whom was now the oldest). They traveled to the Giza Plains during the dry season and spent several days there, hunting and having much deserved fun. Penelo danced for the hares out on the plains and her brother laughed when they began hopping around her in joy.

Later that night, Reks placed a crown of Galbana Lilies on Penelo's head and kissed her, this time on the lips. Lips trembling, Penelo threw her arms around him and whispered that she loved him. He smiled against her and stroked her hair as she nuzzled her face against his shoulder. Vaan pretended not to see them from where he hid in the shadows.

When they went home, Penelo's brother that had stayed behind was sick from the plague. She cried at the door to her brother's bedroom, fear rattling through Penelo as he shouted and coughed for Penelo to stay back. Her eldest brother pulled Reks aside for a long time and when they finally turned to her, she could see that they had come to an agreement. A cold chill ran through her body when her brother took her by the hand and led her to her bedroom. He told her he was going to tend to their brother so he would not suffer alone in his final hours, but that she was to stay away from the two of them until the sickness had passed. When she argued that she could heal him with her magick, her brother only smiled sadly and told her she wasn't strong enough; no one was strong enough to cure the plague.

Reks and Vaan held Penelo back, dragging her away from the house as she pleaded with her brothers not to leave her. For a time, they all went down to Lowtown, so Penelo could have time to adjust to the situation. She cried for three days straight, until she felt empty and cold on the inside. Vaan brought them food, but she refused to eat and Reks had to coerce water down her throat to keep her from dehydrating. They knew what she was feeling, and while Vaan tried to remain optimistic that her brother would get better, Reks said nothing; holding her with a solemn look.

"How are they?" Penelo asked several days later.

Reks had just come back from checking the house and slowly he sat down. Taking Penelo's hand, he met her eyes with a grim line across his mouth, he closed his eyes, unable to say the words that would kill this sweet, innocent girl that he cared for greatly.

"You'll have Vaan and I, for always," Reks finally said, sometime later when Penelo's mournful wails had turned to pathetic choking sobs.

The next year, ten months later to be exact, Reks announced he was going to join the Order of the Knights of Dalmasca, much to the horror of both Vaan and Penelo. He tried to explain to them that as a soldier he would be able to make money to clothe and feed them because it was hard to take care of them all with nearly no money. Vaan, always quick to jump to conclusions, stormed away in anger, unable to bear the deep hurt that had punched him in the gut. Penelo remained deathly quiet and if Reks wasn't standing right in front of her, he would've sworn she had either left too, or had died.

Leather, dried and cracked, found her chin, lifting Penelo's gaze reluctantly up. Reks stared into eyes brimming with silent tears and it broke his heart but Reks knew he couldn't change his mind, no matter the consequences. He kissed one tear streaked cheek, then the other, and then nipped one finger of a glove to pull it off. When both gloves had been shoved into his pocket, he cradled Penelo's small face between his hands and wondered when had they become so big? When had he become a man and she become a beautiful young woman? When had Penelo stopped blushing in his presence and he stopped teasing her about her pigtails?

"Penelo," he started, almost surprised by the sound of his voice, "I'm doing this to protect you and Vaan. You two are all I have left in this world so I must protect you two."

"Are you protecting me for you, or because it was my family's last request to you?" Penelo's voice was small, her words just trembling.

"Because I love you."

Lips touched lips, and Penelo, though still unsure, melted into Reks' arms. It felt reassuring to be enclosed within his arms, it always had for Penelo, but she knew that there was only a fifty-fifty chance Reks would come back alive; it was an all too real flashback to five years before when her brothers had left. She couldn't stop them -- her brothers, her parents, and now Reks -- from leaving her, but she would keep them in her heart forever because she loved each and every one of them regardless if she was alone in the end.

When Vaan did not come back that night, Penelo made her way beneath Reks' bed covers. His mattress was dingy and the springs were beginning to dig their way out from beneath their cushioning but she curled up with him and didn't say a word. Wide awake, terrified of what tomorrow would bring, she listened to Reks' breathing; the sound of his heart. She closed her eyes and inhaled his scent because she wanted to remember as much as she could, just in case. Her fingers touched the naked flesh of his stomach and chest, felt the pulse in his neck, burned her fingers lightly on the stubble of Reks' chin, and smiled when he kissed her wandering fingers.

Blushing now, Penelo pushed herself up and timidly swung one leg over his hips, his pants barely restraining what laid beneath, but she wasn't interested in that - only interested in him and his scents and features. Still, she didn't object when he groaned and shifted so the growing tent in his pants was pressed against her crotch. She leaned forward slightly and watched him hitch his breath, then she touched his face, tracing the shape of it. Tracing the shape of his ears, eyes, nose, and lips followed with her placing a kiss on his slightly parted lips. Bringing her hands down his body, she settled them on his stomach, lean and underfed, but lightly muscled from the various odds-and-ends jobs he'd done around Rabanastre to support the three of them in the last several months.

She shifted her hips as if she was dancing, but without moving her legs, and could feel the muscles of Reks' stomach tighten beneath her hands. Smiling, Penelo ran her hands over his chest next, pausing only to feel the beating of his heart beneath her hand. From here, she became a little unsure of what she was doing but Penelo could tell from the look on Reks' face that he didn't want her to stop moving her hips. Leaning forward, she kissed his chin and throat and shifted to a point where she gasped loudly in surprise because now Reks' tent was pressed stiffly against that special spot between her legs. Afraid to move for a second, she looked up into Reks' questioning eyes and felt calm, moving her body against his again, making sure that he didn't shift away from where he was pressed against.

Penelo whispered his name and Reks groaned hers, grabbing her hips they moved together; bucking and sweating. They panted, until Reks burst within his pants and Penelo had to grind down on him to find the deflated friction of him again. Even though he felt sleepy, Reks arched up and rubbed himself against Penelo's crotch, watching her eyes close and tears mix with sweat as she finally came and cried his name loudly. She embraced Reks tightly, remaining where she was until Reks' breathing finally evened out and his fingers were lazily rubbing her side.

When Penelo opened her eyes next, she was leaning against Reks' tombstone, sobbing loudly as tears fell onto the cold stone. Her arms hurt from where she'd been hugging the stone for dear life, as if Reks could feel her warmth from beyond the grave. It was a long time before Vaan approached her and gently pulled her away, hugging her quietly when she clung to him.

**-End-**


End file.
